Pianodactyl is rhythmically complex, with lots of irregular starts and stops, and the name of the piece refers to Rodan. Strangely enough, however, it has nothing whatever to do with math rock.

The name refers to Rodan temperament, the 26-note MOS of which is used for the scale. The tuning is 87edo. I was tempted to switch tunings when Jacques Dudon posted his own 26-note tuning for Rodan, but equal temperaments are so convenient when using Scala, and 87 has the amazing property that it's exactly the same as the 13-limit Tenney-Euclidean pure-octaves (POTE) tuning (well, the 8/7 generator is 0.00062 cents sharper: if you can comprehend that difference, my hat is off to you.)

The name Rodan is the name of the temperament, one of the Japanese movie monster class which all have 8/7 (7/4) as generator. Rodan the Flying Monster is allegedly some sort of savage mutant pterodactyl, but the temperament is nicely behaved and wonderful if you like lots of 3 and 7 and slightly sharp fifths.

I used Dimitri Tymoczko's amazing dancing orbifolds to help me compose this, but he is in no way to blame for any defects in the result.

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